


soul survivor

by theprinceschamberlain



Series: Supernatural Prompt Challenge [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Demon Dean, Fallen Michael, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Post-Season/Series 09
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-01
Updated: 2016-11-01
Packaged: 2018-08-28 09:32:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8440438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theprinceschamberlain/pseuds/theprinceschamberlain
Summary: When Michael finally pulls himself out of the Cage, it’s to find his vessel, once righteous and good, has been tainted and darkened beyond what his last vestiges of grace can heal. Yet still, Dean’s is the brightest soul in all creation, and Michael is helplessly drawn to it.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Supernatural Prompt Challenge](http://supernaturalpromptchallenge.tumblr.com) October 2016 "horror"-themed prompt "survivor." 
> 
> i thought about doing something dark and twisted because boy howdy do i love me some demon!dean/fallen!michael but then i realized i can't do anything that's not fluff and then this happened idk ᕕ(ᐛ)ᕗ

The sky is brighter than Michael remembers. And blue.

Blue isn’t a color often found in the Cage. It’s not a color found in Hell at all. Too soothing, too calm, too kind _._ Comforting. Soft.

He takes a deep breath of crisp air, feels the cool breeze against his skin. _Skin._ He looks down at his hands, clenches his fists, feels the tendons moving and the bones cracking. His skin is tan under the dirt that covers him from head to foot. He reaches up to pull a leaf from his matted hair, watches it float away in the breeze that pulls it from his fingertips.

He’s tired. It’s a strange sensation, his limbs feeling heavy— feeling his physical limbs at all. He’s more connected to this body than he’s ever been to a vessel; his grace is frayed and torn like his clothes, ragged and bleeding from a near millennia of constant tearing and ripping from his brother.

 _Lucifer._ Michael closes his eyes, jaw clenching. So much anger and hatred burning cold inside his brother. He hadn’t been able to soothe any of it, could only take the pain inflicted and hope his brother might eventually calm down.

He doesn’t remember when he stopped asking God to give him strength to be the bigger person and resist, and started fighting back, throwing all his own anger and betrayal back tenfold.

He’d been the good son, he’d followed every order, no matter how much he disagreed, because if God commanded it then it must be right, he did _everything_ to please their Father—

And an eternity in the Cage was the thanks he got? Fuck that.

Lucifer had looked at him with something akin to pride and knowing in his eyes, but the fighting hadn’t stopped.

He opens his eyes, and continues walking along the long stretch of road he’d come to when he stumbled out of the forest surrounding the clearing he’d pulled himself from. A sign says he’s about twenty miles out from Lebanon, Kansas.

There’s a pull in the pieces of his grace, faint and diluted, but that keeps him putting one foot in front of the other, over and over, despite how he aches deep in his bones. It’s so… human. The air begins to chill as the sun fades below the horizon, and he pulls his leather jacket closer around him instinctively.

He ignores the rumble of engines, keeps his focus forward and watches cars pass periodically from his peripheral. He thinks of a distinct purr, feels the phantom vibrations of a car he’s never been in, yet knows instinctively.

He wonders how the Impala is, if Dean still drives her.

The pull pulses quietly, weakly. It calls for the soul it’s meant for, yearns for that perfect connection between angel and vessel, to be together as one. Absently, Michael presses a hand to his chest, over where his human heart beats a steady rhythm beneath his ribcage. It’s a visceral longing, amplified by the power of human emotion.

It catches him off-guard when an answering burst of desire and longing mixed with a dark anger, old and chaotic, surges through his grace, and Michael nearly falls to his knees. Breath— he doesn’t need it, why can’t he breathe— becomes harder, and his head swims with a sick dizziness. His grace wants to recoil from the feeling, yet is warmed by it all the same, pulled in as a moth to the flame, and he continues forward.

One foot in front of the other, again and again.

The sun is coming up again when Michael finds himself skirting the edges of Lebanon, stumbling into a sleepy diner, half-dead on his feet. He’s tired, so tired, he just wants to sleep— angels don’t need sleep— but he pushes himself to a booth, collapsing into it with a sigh.

An elderly waitress with a kind, understanding smile brings him a steaming mug of coffee and a glass of water along with a menu, and Michael just remembers to thank her before she walks off again. He stares at the dark liquid, watching the steam rise and swirl into the air.

He goes for the water first. It’s refreshingly cool against his throat.

“I didn’t think angels needed food and drink.”

Michael looks over to the sweet green eyes staring at him in amusement from the other side of the booth. The pull in his grace has settled. He’s right where he should be.

There’s a blackness to the soul sitting in front of him. The sick feeling intensifies.

“They don’t,” he answers, setting the empty glass down. The ice rattles against the plastic. “But my grace is…” He trails off with a vague gesture. “Less than it was.”

“I can see that,” Dean says, and for a moment his eyes turn black, and his smile is predatory. “Not quite the all-powerful, glorious general of Heaven anymore, huh?”

Michael moves on to the coffee. It’s bitter on his tongue. “A millennium in the Cage will do that, I guess.”

Dean leans back against the booth, crosses his arms. He’s relaxed, friendly, and Michael relaxes too.

“You were Adam the last time I saw you,” Dean comments. He gestures to Michael now. “You have a thing for my dad or something?”

Michael looks down at his body— the body reminiscent of a younger John Winchester, the vessel he took when he first spoke to Dean, to try to convince him to say yes. He looks back at Dean.

“I sent Adam to Heaven when he said yes,” he says. “His body was no longer usable when I managed to pull myself from the Cage. This is a vessel of my own making.”

“You can do that? Then why did you need me and Sam for the Apocalypse?”

“So it was written,” Michael replies. Dean snorts derisively. “And it takes a great amount of power to form a vessel strong enough to hold an angel, never mind an archangel, so we take humans as vessels.” He pauses, looks down at his coffee. “It seemed an appropriate way to use what grace I had.”

“And you didn’t think to go back to Heaven and the God Squad?”

Michael’s jaw clenches, his fists balling on the Formica table. “I did everything He ever asked of me,” he says bitterly, “even casting my brother, who I loved more than my own life, out of Heaven. And He let me rot in that Cage. I want nothing more to do with Him or my siblings.”

Dean looks at him contemplatively, with empathy. There’s no pity to be found. His eyes are a beautiful forest green flecked with gold now. His freckles stand out on his face. They fall into a companionable silence, and Michael orders the breakfast special when the waitress comes back around. Dean gets the same.

They eat quietly, content to keep the silence between them. Dean smiles sweetly at their waitress when she refills their coffee, complimenting her and making her laugh. Michael watches with soft fascination; despite the taint in his soul, the corrupting _wrong_ influence from the Mark on his arm that sends ice through Michael’s veins just looking at it, Dean is still kind, still _good._

Still the Righteous Man, made as the perfect vessel for the Archangel Michael.

 _Fallen angel_ , he thinks to himself, looking down at his half-eaten meal. He stabs a forkful of hash browns and moves them through the ketchup on his plate before putting it in his mouth.

Dean grins at him, biting into his pancakes drenched in thick, sweet maple syrup.

When they finish their breakfast, Dean leaves money on the table to cover their meals and the tip, and Michael follows him out to the Impala. He smiles when he sees it, trailing his fingers over the hood as he moves to the passenger’s side.

“You going anywhere specific?” Dean asks as he starts the engine.

Michael looks at him, studying his profile, the angle of his nose, the bow of his lips, the way his eyelashes curl. Beautiful and perfect, made just for him. His grace pulses in content, reaching for the tainted soul beside it, and the oily-sick feeling transforms into a burning heat. Bright. Comforting. Soft. Safe.

Kind of like the sky.

Dean glances over at him, eyebrows raised, awaiting a response. His eyes flash black.

“Anywhere but Heaven,” Michael says, settling into the leather seat.

Dean grins and turns up the music, pulling out of the parking lot and onto the road.

**Author's Note:**

> [come say hi on tumblr c:](http://chuckshvrley.tumblr.com)


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